


Adularescence

by Dark Automaton (0Dark_Automaton0)



Category: Ben 10 Series, Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Ambiguous Relationships, Culture Shock, F/F, Fluff, Gemsonas - Freeform, Gen, Hilarity Ensues, Interspecies Friendship, Mixed Series AU, basically omniverse if it didn't totally ignore all the other shows, ben has to give the talk to an alien that doesn't even comprehend the idea of babies
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-02
Updated: 2016-06-04
Packaged: 2018-05-30 20:39:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6439618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/0Dark_Automaton0/pseuds/Dark%20Automaton
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You... You saved me."<br/>From that point onward, Ben got a new partner in fighting crime. And unlike Gwen or Kevin, she'd never let him go.</p>
<p>Mixed Series AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Arrival & Regret

**Scene 1: Arrival**

The ship was much too quiet for her tastes. A white-gloved hand held an ancient device, one she had found deep within the stores of unused technology that her father kept for later repurposing. She had always wondered what the old toad was going to use this thing for. It looked more like a fancy paperweight than what the inscription said on the bottom:

_Crystalline Drive_   
_F-3P1M C-2SM_   
_CAUTION-DO NOT REMOVE CRYSTAL_

Well, _duh_ , she wasn’t going to remove the stinkin’ crystal. As pretty as the pale blue, nearly opalescent stone was, it was way too big to put on a crown or anything without it putting some serious strain on her neck. Besides, it was pretty well jammed in that odd silver tetrahedral shape. Funny, if you looked at it right, you could see a diamond shape…

But that wasn’t what she wanted. She could tell it held some sort of information, or perhaps it unlocked a hidden weapons system. Forest green lips pulled in a smile much too wide for a human’s face. Whatever this thing was, Attea knew, it was going to very, _very_ interesting.

**Scene 2: Regret**

The old communications deck was a relic of her grandfather’s time. To save on ship-building costs and time, old ships would often be layered upon by new parts. The Incurseon mother ship was an exceptional piece of work: layers upon layers of walls and decks, making the vital interior more and more protected with each upgrade. Of course, every time that happened, a new commanding deck had to be constructed so that the navigators could actually look out into space.

Attea allowed herself to imagine what this deck might have been like in its heyday. She pretended for a moment: the dusty panels were shined, the dull floor freshly waxed, and the old rusting equipment the latest. She stood still for a moment, checking to see if anyone had followed her, before bursting into giggles. It always did her good to have a laugh every now and then; being Empress and all was pretty stressful.

When her giggle-fit simmered down into a smile, the amphibious girl explored the old chamber. She remembered the slot being right about- here!

She grinned, dusting off the turned square slot with her unoccupied hand. Fumbling a bit with the drive, she inserted it into the console. Nothing. She removed it, twisted it 90 degrees, before putting it back in. Nothing again. Third time was the charm, as the dark console buzzed to life. Lines of pale blue light trailed the circuitry, and a four-sided pyramid shielding surrounded the crystal drive, blocking Attea from removing it.

The young empress took a step back, watching carefully but expectant. One of the screens of the communications deck came alive with what looked to be nothing but fuzzy white static. The sound made her jump, all the way to the upper deck. She turned her whole body toward the screen, and slowly approached the center of the two-layered deck.

The static halted the moment she set foot in the captain’s place. The sound had suddenly stopped, nearly making her heart stop along with it. The image on the screen turned from frozen static to a pale white blur, like someone was filming with an unfocused camera. Attea’s eyes strained to try and focus for it, but the image slowly focused in on its subject, making the empress’ breath hitch.

In the center of the glowing white screen, was a girl. She looked very… human. That was the only way Attea could describe her, at first. But as the girl onscreen did not move, the Incurseon slowly noticed more and more contrasts than similarities. The girl’s limbs were eerily long, and pencil thin. Last time Attea checked, the only human females with that body type were either photo edited or starving. Next thing she realized, was that the coloration was all wrong. Humans, in their natural state, were an odd orange-pink, cream, or brown color. This girl was gray and blue from head to toe.

One last detail caught her eye most startlingly: the girl was missing an eye. The girl’s right eye was totally missing, and replaced with a pale blue, nearly opalescent gemstone, just like the one in the device.

The girl on the screen moved her head upwards, surprising Attea with her sudden movement. The girl’s one eye was like a mirror, reflecting Attea’s bewildered expression. Then Attea realized it: if that girl is supposed to be on the screen, and the cameras had been gutted from the area, then how did she see Attea?

Attea jumped when the girl spoke,

_“You.”_

Her voice was soft, raspy from years of being unused, and echoed the room,

_“Who are you?”_

“I,” Attea stuttered, mentally kicking herself for being scared of some computer program, “I am Attea, Empress of the deathless Incurseon Empire, light of those who- “

_**“I do not care for your titles, creature,”**_ the girl on the screen interrupted, _“Have you come to free me?”_

“F-free you?” Attea hadn’t thought of that, but dismissed the possibility altogether, “No- “

_**“Then why are you here?”**_ Attea did not mean to make it angry, _**“To mock me?!”**_

“No!” Attea shouted, “I am your Empress! You will follow my command.”

_“No.”_

“What do you mean ‘No’?”

_“I will not serve the most ancient of matriarchs, nor the most noble of generals, **and I will most certainly not follow the whims of some petty child.** ”_

“You did not just say that!”

Attea was growing pretty sick of this weird program. She hopped down to the console, where the device was held, and grabbed onto the shielding. However, just as she touched it, a sudden shock raced up her arms, drawing out a pained yelp. She had a pratfall, rubbing her hands has she sat on the ground.

The screen ghost was not amused, _“If you are not going to release me, then I shall find someone who will. Until then, you might not want to touch that. My data tells me that Incurseon scent sponges do not take kindly to burnt fabric and organic flesh.”_

“Oh, shut up!”

More consoles began powering up, the old electrics humming. Attea wondered if it was too late to call in the guards and get them to shut this down, but they had already arrived. The one at the front asked her,

“Empress Attea, what happened?”

“Old tech gone haywire,” she said, pointing at the crystal drive and ordering, “Get that drive out! I don’t know what this thing’s doing, but I really don’t want to find out!”

Several of the soldiers tried to remove the casing, but to no avail. There wasn’t any grip to be had on the smooth shield, and it shocked anyone who wasn’t wearing insulated gloves. The smell of the burning rubber was absolutely nauseating, to the point where Attea ordered,

“Alright, everybody out! We’ll have to get some special help…”


	2. Call & The Message

** Scene 3: Call **

It was pretty much the perfect day, for Ben at least. The sun was shining, but not quite blazing. The cool guy that occasionally worked at Mr Smoothy’s was there, giving free coupons to whoever could guess the Sumo Slammers character he was talking about. The criminals were not too boring, but not too difficult. Rook seemed to be in a favorable mood too, though that was probably because he got to see Rayona pretty recently.

The two young Plumbers were relaxing by Ben’s favorite smoothy joint, when they got the call. Of course, Grandpa Max radioed them,

_“Ben, get down here. A certain somebody wants to talk to you.”_

“Who?”

_“I’ll give you a hint: she tried to both marry you and take over her empire at the same time.”_

Oh god dammit, it was Attea. Not that he hated her, per say, but she caused trouble essentially every time she walked the Earth. He had to ask,

“Is she actually on the planet?”

_“No, she just called us from her ship.”_

“Okay, we’ll be there shortly.”

The truck roared to life as Rook started it, the Revvonahgander commenting,

“I wonder what she is after this time.”

“Who knows?” Ben shrugged, “Probably wants to talk about conditions for us to put her father into her custody or something.”

**Scene 4: The Message**

“He should be here any minute now,” the elder human told Attea. The empress sat lightly on her throne, wound up like a spring by all the incessant beeping coming from the old communications deck. It reminded her too much of a time bomb getting ready to blow, and it put her on edge. She growled at the old Plumber,

“He better.”

Right on cue, the doors behind the old human opened, revealing the guy she was waiting to see. And his blue fuzzy friend, whom she couldn’t have cared less for. Ben smiled in a gesture Attea recognized as fake yet friendly. She gave a tight-lipped grin herself,

“Hi Ben, did ya miss me?”

“It hasn’t been that long. Is there something the matter?”

Straight to the point; nice. Attea let the grin fall, “Do you hear it?”

“Umm… You mean that beeping? Is that coming from your end or ours?”

“Mine. You see, I need a little help ridding my ship of a little pest.”

Ben crossed his arms, giving Attea a frown, “What kind of pest?”

“Ancient tech gone haywire,” she shrugged, “Some kind of ‘crystalline drive’ from at least a few decades ago.”

“What is it doing?”

“It wants out of its containment – “

_“What is this?”_

The beeping had halted, instead replaced by a faint white noise coming from the speakers. The screens on both ends of the conversation blurred, a silhouette of the cybertronic ghost spearing on the Plumber’s screen. Glowing eye narrowed, inspecting the odd creatures in the other room,

_“Are you coming for me?”_

“What are you?” one of the pinkish-pale-orange creatures she nearly recognized asked her, “And what are you doing to Attea’s ship?”

_“Please, help me…”_ the voice softened to a pathetic whimper, _“I just want out.”_

“We’ll be there to get you out, okay?” Ben said, even as the burst of static placed Attea back in the spotlight of the transmission once more. She looked shocked, and a little… frightened.

“Did that thing just get into the main communications systems?!” Attea shouted at her crew shakily, and Ben was quick to assure her,

“Don’t worry, whoever that was, they’ll be out of your hair in a bit. Or, uh, whatever’s under your cap… Nevermind, how am I going to get there?”

“We’ll be beaming you up,” Attea cleared her throat to try and stave off the shakiness. Ben gave her a thumbs up, “Well, the sooner I get there, the sooner this is over with. C’mon, Rook!”

“Hold on, does he have to go with you?”

“Somebody has to keep me in line.”

Attea rolled her eyes, sighing, “Fine fine,” she called to one of her crew, “Oy, beam ‘em up already!”

“Yes, my empress.”


	3. Removal

**Scene 5: Removal**

The feeling of needles and pins enveloped Ben and Rook as they were sent to the Incurseon mother ship. Ben did not recognize the interior at all; they must use a different ship for invasions, he assumed. Attea smiled and hopped down from her throne with a three-point landing. Rook commented,

“You know, that kind of landing is really bad for your knees.”

Attea completely ignored him, “Ben! Thank the stars you’re here!”

“You’re thanking the stars because…?” Ben questioned her wording.

“Do I look like a little miss ‘Oh goodness!’ girl?” Attea put her hands on her hips, before heading towards the corridor, “I don’t have all day, come on.”

Ben and Rook followed the empress down the halls of the unfamiliar ship. Neither of the young Plumbers let down their guard; Attea was, for all intents and purposes, an on-and-off enemy, and they were on her turf. The walls got progressively rustier and dirtier, the lights getting dimmer. Ben asked,

“Where, exactly, are we going?”

“Like I said before, the old communications deck,” Attea said without looking behind her, “Us Incurseons don’t waste a perfectly good ship when we can simply add a bit more to it. This area’s probably the only old deck that hasn’t been turned into a meeting or throne room.”

“Cool,” Ben said distractedly, before Attea stopped before the double doors to the deck. They were wedged open with a metal bar, which was bending ever so slightly at the pressure. Attea stepped over it, casually saying, “It tried locking the doors when we first tried removing it.”

“So, what was stopping you from getting it before?”

“An electrified defense field, and a really stubborn cyber ghost.”

Ben stepped down to the lower consoles of the deck, “I’m guessing that’s it?” He pointed to the glowing pyramid shape sticking out of the panel. Just as he approached, the shield lowered. He took a step back, “Woah…”

“I think it recognizes you, Ben,” Rook called from his place on the upper deck, Attea piping up, “Just take the stupid thing!”

Ben nodded, extracting the device from the deck. Immediately, the buzzing electronics stopped, and the old deck shut down. The lights dimmed until they matched the ones outside, the empress calling out, “Hey, who turned out the lights?”

“The drive must have been powering the whole deck,” Rook said, as Ben climbed back up, “Fascinating…”

“I have a feeling we shouldn’t expose this to Blukic or Driba,” Ben said, holding the drive up, and asked Attea, “Mind if we take this with us? I don’t think it can do much help for you here.”

“Yeah, sure, whatever,” Attea said dismissively, “Can’t do much if it won’t cooperate.”

On the way back to HQ, Ben couldn’t help but think that whatever was in the drive, it was going to change things around town quite a bit.


	4. Release

**Scene 6: Release**

Ben showed the device to Max, “This was the thing that was bugging Attea; just one drive.”

Max took the drive out of his grandson’s hands, weighing it and looking at it from all angles. He hummed, “Hm, I haven’t seen anything like this since the Eighties. It looks like some sort of Krystalosian technology, but I’ve never seen one of their hard drives look this well cut.”

“Krystalosian?” Rook asked, “I have never heard of them before.”

“They’re not exactly the kind of people you’d want to meet, most of the time,” Max explained, “They’re a race of synthetic beings that basically act like planetary viruses. They inject a host planet with some sort of odd substance, and out pops more of them, at the cost of the local life’s health.

“They tried taking over Earth at some point, but a few defected from the ranks and fought back. The Diamond Authority, their dictators, tried to set up a trap that would destroy the planet, but it was removed when the Plumbers discovered it while setting up base. Pretty sick, that stunt.”

“What was it?” Ben nudged, and Max sighed,

“Krystalosians do not see themselves or living things as people, but as tools to be used or disposed of as their matriarchs please. They don’t see anything wrong with using their own dead as weapons of mass destruction, or killing off many planets worth of life just for a new colony.”

“If that’s the case…” Ben said, connecting the dots, his eyes slowly widening, “Does that mean somebody’s in there?!”

“Ben, if there is somebody in there, they either rebelled against the Diamond Authority or did something wrong – “ Max tried to reason with him, before realizing what he just said, “Wait. Those aren’t actually that bad.”

The boy grabbed the device, turning it in his hands, “How do we get them out?!”

“Krystalosians are sentient gemstones,” Max said, pressing his fingers between the drive and the smooth rock that powered it, “So if you’re theory is correct…”

“It should be coming off right… about… Now!”

The gem came free at last, and landed in Rook’s hands. He looked at it with curiosity, feeling the faint thrum of what he could only assume was mana emanating from the stone, “So, how does this work?”

“Well, if what I last saw of the Crystal Gems was right, she should be regenerating soon, look!” Max said, pointing at the now glowing stone. It flew out of Rook’s hands, levitating several feet above the floor. The stone glowed brighter, as a humanoid glowing figure sprouted from the stone.

**_ _ **

The figure’s base was skinny and long-limbed like a mannequin, before growing appendages that looked more like hair and clothes than arms, shifting through many smaller changes. Finally, it settled on one, and as the glow died down, the small silvery Gem floated gently down to the ground.

Ben couldn’t help but ask, “Are you alright?”

The Krystalosian spoke with a voice much clearer than, but still very similar to, the one from the transmission,

“You… freed me.”

She turned to face the three, a big smile growing on her youthful face. Not one of them did not notice her distinct lack of a right eye; instead the gemstone she emerged from was embedded there. Her braids seemed to pick up with excitement, as if they were limbs like her arms,

“Thank you!”

Without warning, the Gem wrapped her apparently prehensile braids around Rook, Ben, and Max in a big hug, throwing her arms around them when they were closer. Her arms were disproportionately stronger than her tiny build implied. Max took note of the metallic cord-like quality to the braids, and struggled to get out,

“Excuse me, miss? Your welcome and all, but you’re squishing us.”

She let go immediately, dropping them to the ground. Ben nearly coughed up a lung trying to get back the air he lost, Rook doing the same with a little less trouble. The Gem seemed unfazed, her bright tone not fading even as her smile did, “You freed me… Who are you?”

“Ben,” the human boy wheezed out, lifting a hand to shake, “Ben Tennyson.”

The Gem did not take his hand, instead inspecting it with her eye, “Benben Tennyson?”

Ben slapped his forehead with a loud smack, Rook smiling and Max grinning in amusement. Max shook his head, and simply told the Gem, “I’m Max Tennyson,” and gestured to Rook, “and that’s Rook Blanco. We’re Plumbers.”

“Plumbers…” she mumbled, pausing like she was looking something up, “Galactic policy enforcers. Opposed to Diamond Authority. Pro-Crystal Gem. Non-hostile unless provoked.”

She looked Max dead in the eye, and gave a rather odd looking salute; arms crossed with hands tipped to form a diamond shape, “Moonstone Facet 3P1M Cut 2SM.”

Max mimicked the gesture, before they both let the salute fall, “Welcome to Earth.”

**Author's Note:**

> If you're wondering why there's the word "Scene" instead of "Chapter," that's due to how I construct my stories now. I direct them like a film. It makes organizing the story a lot easier.  
> Yeah, this one was kind of tough to get out, but I've posted plenty of material on it on my tumblr, so I decided, "Why not?"  
> You can see what Moonie looks like on my drawing blog: darkautodraws.tumblr.com


End file.
